WBEZ | Michelle Obama

First Lady to urge Chicago business leaders to invest in youth

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 08:28:00 -0500

In a passionate plea to the private sector, First Lady Michelle Obama returned to her hometown Wednesday to help raise money for anti-violence youth programs.

At a downtown Chicago luncheon with 800 civic and business leaders, Obama urged them to contribute to a $50 million public safety campaign led by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

The First Lady grew up in South Shore and said the issue of violence is “personal.” She recounted her working-class family roots and how recent gun murders have touched her emotionally.

Obama recalled meeting with the friends and parents of Hadiya Pendleton - the King College Prep High School student killed days after performing at the presidential inauguration and a mile away from Obama’s Kenwood home.

“As I visited with the Pendleton family at Hadiya’s funeral, I couldn’t get over how familiar they felt to me.

Because what I realized was Hadiya’s family was just like my family. Hadiya Pendleton was me and I was her,” said Obama as her voice cracked. “But I got to grow up.”

Well-heeled members of The Commercial Club of Chicago, Economic Club of Chicago, The Executives’ Club of Chicago and World Business Chicago attended the luncheon. So far, $33 million has been raised. The money is supposed to go to at-risk youth programs, community building strategies and an innovation fund for new programs. All this would be administered over a five-year period by The Chicago Community Trust.

“What it takes to build strong, successful young people isn’t genetics, pedigree or good luck, it’s opportunity and I know from my own experience, I started out with exactly the same aptitude, exactly the same intellectual, emotional capabilities as so many of my peers,” Obama said. She added that the business community has a moral obligation to help local youth.

“This is going to take a serious and sustained investment over a very long period of time,” Obama said. “This is forever.”

After her speech, Obama visited a high school in Englewood, a neighborhood marred by gunplay and poverty. Harper High School was the subject of an earlier documentary by WBEZ's “This American Life.” Twenty-nine current and former Harper students were shot last year.

Obama told students the best thing they could do in life "is really be serious about education."

The mayor said if the city can rally around NATO, the Olympics bid, Millennium Park and Maggie Daley Park, it can rally around children.

When Emanuel announced the $50 million fundraising goal earlier this year, he put Allstate Chief Executive Officer Tom Wilson and Loop Capital Chief Executive Officer James Reynolds in charge.

“I can honestly say I have never been more excited about any effort or initiative I’ve been a part of. The lives we save, the lives we change will ultimately be the test of how well this community responds to its moral duty,” said Reynolds, an Englewood native.

T.J. Crawford is project coordinator for the Black Youth Project and said the mayor’s $50 million initiative needs to address systemic issues.

“[It] will be beneficial only if they do something outside of the box that I haven’t seen him do before: Work directly with community organizations and individuals that have real relationship to our community’s youth and sometimes violent perpetrators to enhance their capacity and support mechanisms to do the work that they have already dedicated their lives to doing,” Crawford said. “It seems we fall in the trap of being able to properly report, quantify and qualify how dollars are being spent without investing in the human capital that is needed to actually create the change we seek. “

Natalie Moore is a WBEZ reporter. Follow her @natalieymoore.

A White House Pool report contributed to this story.

Michelle Obama to Chicago kids: 'I am you'

Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:00:00 -0600

Imagine students learning their ABCs while dancing, or memorizing multiplication tables while doing jumping jacks.

Some schools are using both methods of instruction, and Michelle Obama would like to see more of them use other creative ways to help students get the recommended hour of daily exercise.

In Chicago Thursday, the first lady announced a new public-private partnership to help schools do just that. "Let's Move Active Schools" starts with a website, www.letsmoveschools.org , where school officials and others can sign up to get started.

Mrs. Obama said too many penny-pinched schools have either cut spending on physical education or eliminated it outright to put the money toward classroom instruction. But the first lady who starts most days with a workout — and other advocates of helping today's largely sedentary kids move their bodies — say that's a false choice, since studies that show exercise helps youngsters focus and do well in school.

The effort is one of the newest parts of Mrs. Obama's 3-year-old campaign against childhood obesity, known as "Let's Move," which she has spent the week promoting.

"With each passing year, schools feel like it's just getting harder to find the time, the money and the will to help our kids be active. But just because it's hard doesn't mean we should stop trying," the first lady said. "It means we should try harder. It means that all of us — not just educators, but businesses and nonprofits and ordinary citizens — we all need to dig a little deeper, start getting more creative."

She was joined at McCormick Place in her hometown by several Olympians, including gymnasts Dominique Dawes and Gabby Douglas, sprinter Allyson Felix, tennis player Serena Williams and decathlete Ashton Eaton, along with San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and triathlete Sarah Reinertsen, whose left leg was amputated above the knee when she was a child, and other athletes. Thousands of students from city middle schools also were being brought in for the event.

Research shows that daily exercise has a positive influence on academic performance, but kids today spend too much time sitting, mostly in school but also outside the classroom while watching TV, playing video games or surfing the Internet. Federal guidelines recommend that children ages 6-17 get at least 60 minutes of exercise daily, which can be racked up through multiple spurts of activity throughout the day.

The White House says the most current data, from 2007, shows that just 4 percent of elementary schools, 8 percent of middle schools and 2 percent of high schools provided daily physical education.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan said he's proof of the link between exercise and academic performance. As a boy, he said, he had a hard time sitting still in class but that exercise helped him focus.

"What's true for me is true for many of our nation's children," he said in an interview.

Duncan, who played basketball professionally in Australia, said the choice is not between physical activity or academics, especially with about one-third of U.S. kids either overweight or obese and at higher risk for life-threatening illnesses like heart disease or diabetes.

"It's got to be both," he said. Duncan cited the examples of students learning the alphabet while dancing or memorizing multiplication tables while doing jumping jacks.

Mrs. Obama called on school staff, families and communities to help get 50,000 schools, about half the number of public schools in the U.S., involved in the program over the next five years.

The President's Council on Fitness, Sports & Nutrition, the American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation & Dance, and the Alliance for a Healthier Generation will oversee the program. Funding and other resources will come from Nike Inc., the GENYOUth Foundation, ChildObesity180, Kaiser Permanente and the General Mills Foundation.

Under the new initiative, modest grants will be available from the Education Department to help some programs get started. The GENYOUth Foundation and ChildObesity180 also will be awarding grants.

Nike has committed $50 million to the effort over the next five years; the remaining groups together have pledged more than $20 million.

Williams said it's important to structure the activity so that it doesn't feel like a workout.

"I had fun and I didn't realize it was work," she said about her years of practice before becoming one of America's top tennis players.

Hadiya Pendleton's parents to sit with first lady at State of the Union

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 13:01:00 -0600

Updated: 1 p.m.

A White House official says the parents of a Chicago teenager slain just days after performing during President Barack Obama's inauguration will attend his State of the Union speech.

Hadiya Pendleton, 15, was shot to death Jan. 29 in a park close to the Obama's Chicago home. Police say a gunman hopped a fence and opened fire on a group of young people. She was a majorette with the King College Prep band. Police have said Pendleton was an innocent victim in a gang-related shooting. Her death was among dozens of homicides in Chicago last month, though her background and ties to Obama thrust her death into the national headlines.

First lady Michelle Obama attended Hadiya's funeral in Chicago on Saturday. Her parents, Cleopatra and Nathaniel Pendleton, will sit with the first lady during Tuesday's speech, which is expected to mention gun violence.

A judge has ordered two gang members charged with Pendleton's murder be held without bail.

Cook County Judge Israel Desierto on Tuesday ordered 18-year-old Michael Ward and 20-year-old Kenneth Williams held.

Ward and Williams were charged Monday with first-degree murder, two counts of attempted murder and aggravated battery with a firearm, Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy said Monday night. Both were taken into custody late Saturday while on their way to a strip club — and just hours after first lady Michelle Obama and other dignitaries attended Pendleton's funeral.

Police say the shooters mistook Pendleton and her friends for members of a rival gang and attacked the group in retaliation for a shooting that injured one of them over the summer.

"Ward confessed and indicated Hadiya was not the intended target. They got it all wrong," McCarthy said.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel says he's talked to the Pendleton's Monday about the two young men who were taken into custody over the weekend.

At a news conference, Emanuel said the call was one of several he's made to relatives of Pendleton, adding that most of the other calls were made simply to comfort them.

Meanwhile, Emanuel, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez and McCarthy said they'll push for state legislation that increases the minimum sentences for those who violate the state's gun laws.

Michelle Obama to attend Hadiya Pendleton's funeral in Chicago

Thu, 07 Feb 2013 13:10:00 -0600

WASHINGTON — A White House official says Michelle Obama will attend Saturday's funeral for the 15-year-old Chicago girl who was killed after returning home from performing during inauguration festivities for President Barack Obama.

Hadiya Pendleton was killed in a park close to the Obamas' home on Chicago's South Side. Police say a gunman hopped a fence and opened fire on a group of young people, killing the drum majorette. No arrests have been made.

White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett and Education Secretary Arne Duncan, both from Chicago, also will attend the funeral.

Pendleton's death brought renewed attention to Chicago's homicide rate and the debate over gun violence in America.

The White House official spoke on condition of anonymity because the first lady's travel plans had not been formally announced.

Zulkey bits and pieces

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 08:29:00 -0600

There are some little bits and pieces I would like to share with the Internet but none of them can really be turned into a whole post, so here you go: it’s potpourri day.

1.) Funny Ha-Ha is returning next month with a fabulous lineup! Check it all out in our gorgeous poster right here.

2.) My husband Steve Delahoyde made a very nice short (as in three minutes long) piece about the origins of the poetry slam right here in Chicago (see below). You’ll probably like it.

3.) I wrote this piece for the Hairpin called “That Baby Wants to Break You Up.” It should be noted that a.) Coincidentally, life seemed to get a lot easier right after I wrote it and b.) It’s not meant as a cautionary tale against having children. I’m just not likely to write a piece called “Here Are All The Ways I Love My Adorable Baby.” It’s just meant as catharsis first, and maybe commiseration, second.

4.) Finally, Michelle Obama’s bangs! I don’t have much to say about them (they’re fine? But she was also fine without them.) But my mother wanted me to mention that Mamie Eisenhower was also famous for her bangs. Duly noted. Eek!

Obama will use family Bible for presidential swearing in

Fri, 18 Jan 2013 16:05:00 -0600

When Barack Obama is sworn in as president during the private Sunday ceremony, he’ll bring some of his wife’s family history to that ritual, namely the Bible from wife Michelle's family — the Robinsons.

The Robinson Family Bible was a gift from the First Lady’s father to his mother. Fraser Robinson III gave it to LaVaughn Delores Robinson on Mother’s Day in 1958. She used the Bible regularly.

Omar McRoberts, a sociology professor at the University of Chicago who studies black religious life, said Obama’s use of the Robinson Bible gives the public a peek into the president.

"It’s a statement about his private identity, that is, his personal identity. As someone who identifies closely with his wife’s family’s African-American Christian heritage," McRoberts said.

On Monday Obama will be sworn in using two other Bibles: President Abraham Lincoln’s and Dr. Martin Luther King’s.

Maggie Daley remembered at funeral mass: tireless advocate, devoted mom, big singer

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 21:50:00 -0600

Chicago's former first lady, Maggie Daley, was honored Monday in a funeral mass at Old Saint Patrick's Church just west of the city's downtown. Daley died on Thanksgiving at the age of 68.

So many people showed up, that more than a few Chicago aldermen were relegated to the church basement to watch the scene on TVs. Others without seats stood outside the church, listening to just the piped-out sound.

Delivering the homily, Father Jack Wall spoke of Maggie Daley's nearly decade-long fight with breast cancer.

"Some people when the going gets tough, they just see themselves as victims," Wall said. "But this woman kept on saying, Nothing is going to take life from me. Nothing. I'm too busy giving it away."

Wall talked of Daley's work to establish a parish school at Old St. Pat's, and her committment to after school programs for Chicago's kids. And he described the former first lady's personal "blue law."

"There was not going to be one mayoral event on a Sunday," he recalled. "There had to be a family day, a day where people celebrate and nurture this gift of family."

Speaking for the Daley children, son Patrick provided a personal remembrance.

"Enjoying life, laughter, and the occasional piece of dark chocolate," he said to laughter. "She was the first one out and the last one off the dance floor. She was a singer, encouraging everyone - sometimes very strongly - to join her."

"As a mother, she was the embodiment of unconditional, yet tough, love," Patrick Daley said. "And as a grandmother, we saw her move from tough love and discipline to tenderness and indulgence."

Former Mayor Richard Daley embraced his children when they returned to their seats. He did not speak at the mass.

Others in attendance: Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, First Lady Michelle Obama, U.S. Sens. Duck Durbin and Mark Kirk, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan.

Bagpipes played outside the church. As the casket was carried out to the hearse, the former mayor followed right behind.

By order of the current mayor, Rahm Emanuel, city flags are supposed to remain at half-mast for the rest of the week in honor of Maggie Daley.

Michelle Obama talks healthy food on South Side

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 16:15:00 -0500

First Lady Michelle Obama returned to her native South Side Chicago on Tuesday to promote her initiatives on healthy eating for children as well as her quest to eliminate food deserts.

Obama stopped by a refashioned Walgreens on 75^th and State Street. Last year the chain started stocking its shelves with fresh fruits and vegetables in neighborhoods where crisp produce is scarce. Often, such food deserts either lack healthy stores or are home to stores where processed and junk foods prevail.

The First Lady said the issue of food deserts speaks directly to her.

“I saw this growing up in my own community,” said Obama, who grew up in Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood. “Starting out with wonderful grocery stores but slowly, but surely, as the economies changed, many of these resources just disappeared into thin air. This is true for so many communities across the country. This just isn’t happening in Chicago or on the South Side.

“If folks want to buy a head of lettuce for a salad or some fruit for their kids’ lunch, they’d have to take two or three buses to do it.”

Obama invested time and considerable political capital in a program called “Let’s Move,” which aims to reduce childhood obesity.

Her visit coincides with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s daylong food access summit. Mayors from around the country gathered in Chicago to explore best practices to expand fresh food in underserved communities.

The summit wasn’t open to the public.

Emanuel said on Tuesday that 17 new chain stores will be opening on the city’s South and West Sides. They include Save-A-Lot, Roundy’s, Wal-Mart and Aldi. Some of these stores have been in the works. In addition, 19 expanded Walgreens will include fresh food.

The mayor said new stores are opening on blighted property.

“What was an eyesore is now an economic opportunity and job creator in our community,” Emanuel said.

But some Chicago food justice advocates aren’t convinced that chains or big-box stores are the food desert corrective. A group known as Advocates of Urban Agriculture sent a letter to Emanuel on Tuesday that ties food deserts to historic disinvestment in neighborhoods. To the advocates, the issue is just as much economic as it is about good eating.

“The ‘solution’ to ‘food deserts’ requires attention to and investment in local, neighborhood-based ownership of food enterprises. This includes a full spectrum of activities, from all scales of food production through processing, distribution, and sales, inclusive of the associated goods and services that accompany a full-fledged food economy. A rich, textured, and comprehensive economy will grow the health and wealth of people in their neighborhoods,” the letter said.

Specifically, the group wants the mayor to hire a food system and enterprise coordinator, work with a Chicago food council and direct healthy food funds to neighborhood-based business owners.

Emanuel said his food desert plan is comprehensive. He said Walgreens and Aldi have signed a memorandum of understanding to sell locally grown produce from Growing Power, a South Side urban farm.

This fall, the Chicago City Council passed Emanuel’s urban agriculture ordinance, which strips the red tape from city farming. More farms are starting to open.

On Tuesday morning, a former contaminated park in Little Village opened as a repurposed organic farm.

First brother-in-law Craig Robinson talks character on and off the court

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 13:30:00 -0500

In A Game of Character Michelle Obama’s brother Craig Robinson examines basketball as a metaphor for life. His memoir also takes readers inside the now famous family who shaped his life and values on and off the court.

The native South Sider and current Oregon State University coach visited Eight Forty-Eight in 2010 upon release of his book. He started by talking about when Michelle met President Barack Obama. He said the Robinsons weren’t sure Obama - aka "The Big B"– would make the grade.

Everyday Icon: Book dissects Michelle Obama's style

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 12:54:00 -0500

First lady Michelle Obama’s fashion has made headlines around the world. She’s known for taking risks - with color, accessories, cardigans and lesser known designers. But this connection between fashion and the first lady goes way back – all the way to the original White House inhabitant Mary Washington. So is all the scrutiny and celebration of Obama’s fashion unprecedented?

TIME magazine’s Kate Betts says the Chicago native is a trailblazer in some aspects. She’s been keeping her eye on the fashion choices coming out of the White House and finds a reason and a rhyme to it all. Betts decodes Michelle Obama’s style in her new book, Everyday Icon: Michelle Obama and the Power of Style, and she joined Eight Forty-Eight to talk about First Lady fashion.

Betts will read from her book Tuesday afternoon at the Women’s Athletic Club of Chicago.